


Hattifatteners' gift

by pikkugen



Category: Mumintroll | Moomins Series - Tove Jansson
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-26
Updated: 2011-12-26
Packaged: 2017-10-28 03:40:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/303334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pikkugen/pseuds/pikkugen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's Midsummernight's Eve, and Snufkin has sown some more Hattifatteners... There might be Hattifatteners' orgies, or not. XD</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hattifatteners' gift

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sallyislike](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sallyislike/gifts).



> Beta by AntigravityDevice

It was Midsummernight's Eve, and Snufkin had just sown some Hattifattener seeds on a suitable meadow between the sea and the woods. The day had been hot and heavy, the dark purple clouds were towering and rolling over the sea rumbling ominously. The tops of the clouds had anvil-shaped forms and their bellies were greenish – there would be both thunder and hail coming.

Snufkin stood and watched the clouds gathering. He saw the first bolts of lightning criss-crossing the sky over the sea and laughed aloud. Wind billowed his green jacket and tried to grab his hat from his head, so he grasped it firmly with both hands and made sure the Hattifatteners would grow properly and not be drowned in the coming rain. What a way to be born, he thought, straight into a thunderstorm when you were already electric from growing. He laughed again to see the sheets of rain running on the rolling sea towards the shore and cast an eye on the little white forms popping out of the grass before turning and running towards his tent just in time before the rain arrived. It was never a good idea to stay in the forest during a thunderstorm, and he had put up his little yellow tent a good distance from both the meadow, the trees and the sea.

The first Hattifatteners had grown just enough to have eyes, and they seemed to turn towards the hissing lightning in awe and expectation. They had no mouths, but when their tiny white hands had grown and opened from their sides, they fluttered them eagerly as if giving applause. The rain had arrived to the shore by then, and the drops of water hissed and popped when they touched the little white creatures. Some tiny blue lightning was already forming on one Hattifattener. It jumped from one tiny white head to another with a delighted zap, and the other Hattifattener bent a little and set the lightning on to another beside it. Soon the whole meadow was alive with electric patterns much like the ones on the cloud walls above.

The Hattifatteners started to bend and bow and flutter in earnest. They seemed to search for each other's touch and eagerly shared the flickering blue lightning among themselves. Snufkin watched from the shelter of his tent, enchanted. The white shapes seemed so... alive, so vibrant with their energy, as if they didn't quite know what to do with it.

Then the thunder spoke again. A hissing, huge blue lightning struck the sandy shore just on the waterline and Snufkin tried to memorize the place. The force of the lightning would have melted the sand into a frail tube of glass, sand-covered and beautiful, and it just might be strong enough to be lifted from the ground.

The Hattifatteners hurried towards the spot. They huddled close together and fluttered their tiny hands up to the roaring storm, their huge yellow eyes alive and glowing, their whole being reaching to the charge of energy and their mass opening a channel for the lightning to strike. Snufkin felt the hair standing on his head and braced himself for the strike.

An enormous bolt of lightning shot down from the sky and hit the tiny, white Hattifatteners with its full force. For a moment the whole shore was filled with the bitter, peculiar smell of ozone and a blinding, purple-white light. The sound was so overwhelming it deafened Snufkin immediately. He blinked his eyes and tried to see what had happened to the little creatures.

They were ecstatic. They stood all in one big white lump, their heads thrown back, their eyes closed in rapture, their little hands not fluttering for a long moment, and a tiny blue aftercharge flickering over them and searching for a grounding point.

The rain had stopped for a while. Snufkin came out of his tent and walked slowly towards the Hattifatteners. He knew it probably wasn't wise, they must be dangerously electric still, but he couldn't help it. As he approached, they all opened their eyes and looked at him, and before he could turn and run or even move, they had surrounded him and grabbed his legs with their tiny flickering hands.

The jolt of their touch dropped him to his knees. The tiny blue lightning travelled up his legs, through the pit of his stomach and straight up to his head, and he moaned – not from pain, but from similar ecstasy they must have felt. The faint smell of ozone and desire surrounded him. The Hattifatteners withdrew from him and he fell on the shore with his face in the sand.

The storm awakened him. The cold rain hit him on the back and forced him to rise, but when he tried to push himself up from the sand, his hands met something unexpected. A brittle, sharp glassy line that cut his fingers. He dug a little sand off it and lifted it carefully up for the rain to wash it clean.

It was a large glass bowl, shaped like a group of Hattifatteners and patterned with half-melted sand. He stared at it for a while and started to laugh tiredly.


End file.
